Okay, Laci Peterson’s death was tragic, yes, but c’mon!
CNN is playing her lengthy memorial service over and over and over, and it rivals Princess Di’s!
Why is this case getting such enormous national coverage? Why were there thousands of people at a memorial for an ordinary woman they never met?
Because she was rich, white, and pregnant.
You forgot attractive.
As much as I think her death was a tragedy–and it obviously was horrible for everyone who knew her–what the hell is up with the media feeding frenzy that moves from one ‘entertainmurder’* to another?
*I Googled. I think I invented “entertainmurder.” It’s true though, isn’t it? Remember when people had to bombard the 24-7 news channels with e-mail to stop the Robert Blake coverage?
Showing the freaking birthday/memorial service on TV was extremely tacky. My husband kept cringing whenever clips were shown on news broadcasts, and once I even yelled at the TV, “We’re strangers, we shouldn’t be seeing this!” Cripes, showing crying people spilling out their guts for the national audience, it was horrible.
I feel for the friends/family involved, but please, take the mourning private now. When she was missing I could understand it, and even when her body was discovered, but there’s a time to just not broadcast this stuff any longer and I think it’s come.
Superglued to your chair, eyelids pinned back, forced to watch the memorial service - the tyranny of modern-day Amerika astounds me.
Hey, they’ve got 24 hours to fill in every single day. It never stops!!!
I didn’t see it on the channels I was watching…
Yeah, yeah, I knew someone would say this. What, I can’t criticize what’s being shown on TV? (That’d make the discussions in Cafe Society mighty short - express enthusiasm or get the “change the channel then” smackdown.) Not only the national news but the local broadcasts were showing it, even when we switched channels. We did our best to avoid it but wasn’t easy - I did yell that while grabbing the remote, just FYI.
I’m saying that there’s certainly no call for a local TV news show not based in CA to show a few minutes’ worth of this during multiple broadcasts. It’s stupid.
For me it is a question of journalistic ethics. There are dozens of important stories going uncovered every time they interview another lawyer about the Peterson case. I don’t understand how they make news out of a legal case which is moving at legal flank speed. Which is to say glacially.
I must admit I haven’t seen whether Scott Peterson’s lawyers have opted for a speedy trial or not. That’s the only newsworthy item that will come out any time soon, I’d reckon. Maybe the prosecution will leak some evidence. Whatever, it’s still not national news.
I agree though. I only watch long enough to decide not to watch.
I watch CNN headline news for 30 minutes in the morning before going to work-long enogh to just get the highlights of what’s going on in the wrld. I saw this crap three times in that 30 minutes, complete with sappy “I Will Remember You” montage for the benefit of all the mourners that “never met Laci”!
That is simply way over the top!
Around the Detroit area I haven’t seen anything about Peterson lately because we had an “Amber Alert” for some kid that got carjacked in her baby seat.
They found her the next day and she’s OK, btw. And they got the guy who stole the car, too.
See, this is why I never watch the news. I’ll read the paper, I’ll look on websites, or sometimes I’ll listen to NPR, but that’s only because I have WQED on.
I think ‘murdertainment’ would be a better term or maybe ‘tragi-tainment’.
And why wasn’t this girl’s memorial service covered?
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/South/04/22/body.found/
Poor and white with a warrant out for her arrest? Yet, she was still young and pregnant. I live in the neighboring state and heard nothing about this case until they found her body. How can Laci’s family possibly begin to heal with all of this media?
Margo
Margo, I’m in East TN, and I hadn’t heard that story at all, and I normally read the paper or watch the news on a daily basis.
I had CNN on this morning, until they did that montage “from the beginning” as they put it. Frankly, I’m tired of the whole thing and tend to block out (or change the channel) when something comes on.
CNN is now on my lists of the worst possible source for news in the history of mankind (right after NPR). First they say basically that they w/h vital info about Iraq for pretty much their own selfish reasons (calling in to question their ethics) then devote 138 hours a week to covering some chick I don’t know that was killed by her psycho husband that I don’t care about. Not to be callous, but if he killed her six times and had sex with her dead body, I still would not consider it to be newsworthy enough to show 24 hour coverage for 18 weeks… And if it was my wife/daughter/sister/neighbor/chick i saw once at the grocery store, i would have long since told the media to get the fuck away from me or there would be some much more newsworthy goings on.
I haven’t been paying attention. Was that Laci Peterson’s body they dragged out of the harbor a few weeks ago? Either way, I really don’t care anymore*. Lawyer’s business now, not mine.
*Not that I cared much to begin with, seeing as how it took place an entire country away from me and I don’t know anyone involved in the case.
Who’s playing Scott in the made for TV movie?
Anybody know yet?
I thought the Petersens weren’t “rich.” They were scraping by, and John was working two jobs.
Trinopus